NETHERLANDS – NIB Capital, the merchant bank owned by the two largest Dutch pension funds, has received a bid from a former board member of Goldman Sachs, according to press reports.

The Wall Street Journal reported that a private equity fund headed by Christopher Flowers has made a bid of almost €2bn for the group. It follows a similar bid by Cerberus Capital Management, it added.

Fortis and a combination of GE Capital and Lehman Brothers have already made a bid for NIB Capital. Fortis has reportedly offered €1.6bn.

NIB Capital is jointly owned by civil service scheme ABP and healthcare scheme PGGM, the two largest pension funds in the Netherlands. Its assets under management total €5.4bn.

According to the paper, a decision is being expected within two weeks. Despite the significantly higher bids of the two private equity funds, it isn’t clear whether they’ll win the take-over battle, it added.

NIB’s stakeholders are reportedly worried about the way private equity owners deal with potential problems at a company like NIB Capital, which specializes in complex derivatives and activities on capital markets in many countries. A spokesman of Fortis declined to comment, to the paper.

Fortis is able to finance a purchase of NIB Capital from its own coffers. Even after the recent take-over of the Turkish Disbank, the Dutch-Belgian company has €4bn available for acquisitions.

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